


All or Nothing

by nightwalker



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Canon Compliant, Canon-Typical Violence, Garrison trio, Gen, Mission Fic, Team Bonding, Team as Family, Voltron Gen Mini Bang 2018
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-21
Updated: 2018-07-21
Packaged: 2019-06-13 18:47:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,077
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15370995
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nightwalker/pseuds/nightwalker
Summary: Splitting up is never a good idea, but this is a slightly worse idea than usual. It's fine though, they've got this. With a little help.





	All or Nothing

**Author's Note:**

> Huge, huge thanks to [Cyy](https://cyyaanide-art.tumblr.com/) for her amazing artwork which inspired this story!
> 
> Written for the 2018 Voltron Gen Mini Reverse Bang. Thanks also to Musicalluna and GeneralKenobi for the proofreading and cheerleading.

Coran said something unrepeatable.

Not that that was particularly unusual – Keith considered half the things that came out of Coran's mouth to be completely incomprehensible and the rest wild non-sequiturs, at best. But today he was even harder to understand than usual.

Fortunately he wasn't the only one who thought so.

Lance stepped up next to Keith and leaned in to peer at the image of the planet below, arms crossed over his chest. “They're the who-now?”

“The Kespae'eto'aian'ettians,” Coran repeated cheerfully. “We just called them the Kes back in the day, of course. Much less of a mouthful and the Kes never seemed to mind any – mind you the Kes never seemed to mind much of anything, up to and including the Galra during the early days of the war.”

“They were very technologically advanced,” Allura said thoughtfully. She was watching the mostly greenish sphere that was the... the Kes homeworld as it spun slowly beneath them. “And very far away. They were trade allies but not part of the Empire.”

“Barely allies even,” Coran said. “Oh, they were friendly enough but they were friendly to everyone, even the despised Reavers of the Velkomen Nebula.”

“Seems like a dangerously optimistic way to approach the galaxy,” Pidge said.

Hunk made a face at her. “Optimism isn't dangerous, Pidge. They just... had faith in the universe.”

“And a planetary defense system that made Altea's look obsolete,” Coran said. “But they did have an attitude of expecting the best and being prepared for the worst.”

“That's a good attitude to have, if you can afford it,” Keith said. “But it's the kind of attitude that gets less advanced civilizations enslaved. Or worse.”

Lance looked at him from beneath hooded eyes. “I love your sunny outlook on life, man. I don't know how you manage to avoid bursting into song on a daily basis.”

“Your face knocks it out of me, mostly,” Keith said, and bit back a grin when Lance made a sound like a cat strangling on a fish bone.

Shiro wrapped one hand around the back of Lance's neck and pulled him a couple of feet away from Keith before he could even open his mouth to retort. “How technologically advanced are we talking here?”

“Selectively,” Coran said. “They had made advances in medicine and healing that led to a golden age in this part of the galaxy. And they were light years ahead of us in matter reconstitution, not to mention energy production and weather creation. And rumor had it they had terraforming technology that could transform an entire world in _days_ instead of the months it took us.”

Pidge arched an eyebrow and peered at Coran over the top of her glasses with a grin. “So Alteans weren't the most advanced society?”

He twirled his mustache and smirked. “Oh goodness no. Why, there were societies as far ahead of us as… well, as we Alteans are ahead of you Earthlings.”

Lance snorted and Hunk and Pidge snickered. Shiro shook his head. “Walked right into that one.”

“Ah, I set him up for that one,” Pidge said. She gestured toward the planet. “So what happened to them?”

“The Galra, probably,” Allura said, voice soft enough that it could barely be heard. “That seems to be the answer every time, doesn't it? World after world, the Galra have stolen, murdered or destroyed everything remarkable this universe had to offer.”

Keith dropped his eyes away from the viewer. He very deliberately did not reach for his mother's knife, in its sheath on his belt.

“Not everything,” Lance said. “You're still here!” He flashed her a bright smile, and batted his eyelashes at her like the heroine in some silly movie. For a second Keith had to resist the urge to slap him upside the head, but it was too over the top to be serious, even for Lance. Anyway, Allura had lost the dark look and was rolling her eyes at him, which was probably his intent.

Probably. Keith honestly had no idea what Lance thought he was doing half the time. “So, these Kes,” Keith said. “Advanced weaponry?”

“Hardly any,” Allura said. “They were pacifists, if I recall correctly.”

“Not really pacifists,” Coran said. “Pacifists are pacifists because they believe in something. The Kes were just advanced enough that there was nothing anyone could do to hurt them. Why waste time and resources and lives fighting an enemy you could just ignore? Drove Zarkon mad, I expect.”

“Short trip,” Lance said. “So if the Kes are long gone and they didn't have any weapons to help us fight the Galra... why did we come all the way out to the rim of the galaxy to check out an abandoned world?”

“No _weaponry_ ,” Pidge said. “But Coran just said they had massively advanced defenses. If we could dig up some of their tech – even if none of it works anymore, I bet Hunk and I could learn a lot just by studying it. If we could improve our shields – or build shields for liberated worlds like the Balmarans –“

“It would give us a massive edge in the fight against Zarkon,” Shiro said. “We could make people feel safe again.”

Keith eyed the green planet. He thought it would take a lot more than some shields to make people feel safe from the Galra.

“It'll take a lot more than some fancy shields to undo ten thousand years of Galra rule,” Allura said. She sighed, the tension easing out of her shoulders slightly. “But Pidge and Shiro are right. It would be a start. It would give us something to help these worlds stand on their own. We can't stay and personally guard every planet we liberate.”

“So we give them the ability to defend themselves,” Lance said. “Get them standing on their own, without the Galra _or_ Voltron calling the shots for them.”

“Precisely, my dear boy.” Coran tugged on one end of his mustache. “Nothing motivates more than the taste of freedom. The Kes are gone, and this world is abandoned, but down in those ruins we may find something that will make them a suitable legacy.”

****

They set the lions down on the shore of a massive lake somewhere in the northernmost continent of the Kes homeworld. The water was dark blue and dotted with what looked like lily pads along the banks. Thick, leafy vines ran from the trees to the water where the forest came right up to the edge of the lake.

The forest itself was dense and dark, even in daylight. The trees were huge, towering a hundred or more feet into the air, their trunks so thick around that no one of them would be able to wrap their arms entirely around them. The same leafy vines dangled from the branches, and Pidge could see patches of moss, as well as thick piles of straw and grasses – nests, probably.

It was pretty, peaceful in that way wild places could be. Pidge wasn't much for the out-of-doors, traditionally, but she could appreciate a pretty scene when she saw one. She cast a fond thought toward her lion and grinned at the soft feeling of amusement that rolled back to her like distant thunder. Green never seemed to mind having landed a paladin who wasn't particularly interested in the soft sciences, fortunately.

Her scanner beeped at her insistently and she skimmed the readings, all thoughts of the scenery fading to the background. She adjusted her equipment again, just to be on the safe side, but the readings came up the same.

“I'm getting energy readings,” Pidge said, raising her voice to be heard over the wind.

Lance and Hunk were examining something at the water's edge and Keith was staring warily into the forest with one hand on his bayard, so Shiro was the only one who seemed to hear her. “What kind of readings?” he asked, eyes sharp and shoulders a lot less relaxed than they had been a minute ago.

“Nothing I recognize,” she said. “So not Galra, probably.” She held up her tablet screen so he could see. “It's not very powerful, but there's definitely consistent energy patterns coming from a couple miles south of here.”

“Is there anyway to tell what it is?”

Pidge shrugged. “I mean, short of going over there and digging it up?” She frowned a little, chewing on her bottom lip as she scanned the readings again. “Huh. There's one closer now.”

Shiro crossed his arms. “I'm not liking this.”

“It's really weak, whatever it is.” Pidge looked up from the tablet and scanned the treeline. “I think it's coming from over here.” She pointed, already moving toward the forest's edge.

“Pidge,” Shiro said. “Let's wait for the others before we go exploring.”

“It's not very strong,” she said. Her glasses had slipped down her nose so she pushed them back up and peered into the trees. Up close the forest was just as dark as it had looked from their lions, but she could see now that it was mostly because of the massive canopy. The ground was covered in a dense layer of moss, but there wasn't much in the way of undergrowth – no thick bushes or stickers.

“Old growth forest,” she muttered under her breath. She wondered how long the forest had been there. If there were energy readings here, then this may have been civilization once. “You know, this might have been a city a couple of millennia ago. When the Kes left, nature reclaimed the land and now you can't even tell anything was ever here.”

“Like ghost towns back on Earth,” Shiro said. “Or Okuma.”

“Only way older,” Pidge said. “These trees – I know we're not on Earth, but if we were I'd say these were _thousands_ of years old.”

“What are the odds that this energy reading of yours is also thousands of years old?” Shiro asked. “Could there be someone else out there?”

“Maybe, but doubtful. We didn't see any signs from orbit. If anyone's here, they're living underground.”

“That doesn't make me feel better,” Shiro said. “Pidge, don't get too close to the edge. We don't know what's in there.”

She studied the energy readings a little more closely, trying to pinpoint exactly where they were coming from. Somewhere ahead of her in the forest, but she couldn't pinpoint exactly how far. “Coran didn't see any large life signs when we scanned the planet.”

“Small things can be dangerous too,” Shiro said. “I'm speaking to living proof of that, at the moment.”

She looked away from the scanner long enough to stick out her tongue. “You just called me short.”

“I did,” Shiro said. “What are you seeing?”

“I don't know. The energy signature looks similar to the one I saw further south but I swear it wasn't here before we landed. It's weak, but not that weak – I'd definitely have seen it.” She pushed her glasses further up her nose. “Which means something happened to start it between us doing the last scan, and me setting up my equipment on the planet.”

“You mean we set something off,” Shiro said. “We tripped an alarm.”

Pidge nodded. “Yeah, that could explain it. Like a perimeter alert or-”

“ _Heads up!_ ” Shiro yelled over his shoulder. “Back to the lions, _now!_ Pidge, get out of-”

The air between them seemed to warp and waver, like heat waves off hot asphalt.

“Oh, _quiznak_ ,” Pidge said, and lunged toward Shiro.

****

“Do you think it rains here?” Lance asked.

Keith looked around for a second before realizing they were alone and Lance was therefore, probably, talking to him. “Um, yes? Probably. They have water so... I'm not a meteorologist, Lance.”

“I don't think I've seen it rain once since we left Earth.” Lance was standing down by the edge of the lake, head tipped back toward the sky. Keith looked up for a minute, but it was still just a mostly blue-looking sky full of mostly wispy greyish clouds. “I miss rain.”

“No one misses rain,” Keith said. “People complain about rain.”

“Maybe.” Lance wasn't looking at him. “I miss the way the beach looks in a thunderstorm.”

Oh. _Oh_. This was a homesickness thing. Keith had... absolutely no fucking idea what he was supposed to say to that. “We got some really awesome storms in the desert.”

“Yeah?” Lance actually looked at him then.

Keith shrugged, searching for something to say that wasn't going to start a fight. “I liked the lightning.”

That seemed to be satisfactory to whatever mood Lance was in. “Yeah. Sometimes we could see it light up the ocean all the way to the horizon. The water would look like it was glowing.”

“The mountains got in the way,” Keith said. “But once a storm got in there it was caught, and it'd bounce back and forth off the mountains for days.” And then it would flood, he thought, but didn't add, and they'd spent weeks cleaning up and trying to salvage what they could.

“Heh. Yeah, I guess it would get old if it went on for that long.” Lance had his bayard in his right hand, still unformed since they seemed to be alone. He tapped it against his thigh a few times in a nervous tic that Keith had noticed a few times before. “I was thinking it might rain with all those clouds.”

Keith eyed the scraggly bits of blue-grey fluff Lance considered clouds with a skeptical glance. “Maybe. If it does we can watch the lightning over the lake.”

“It'll probably rain acid or rocks or lava,” Lance said.

Keith bit back a grin. “Probably. That seems to be how it works in this part of the universe.”

Lance sighed. “Yeah. That's probably the Galra's fault, too.”

Keith looked away for a minute, even though Lance wasn't looking at him anymore. “Yeah. Probably.”

“Where's Pidge going?”

Keith followed Lance’s gaze to see Pidge marching off toward the forest, Shiro in tow. “She must have found something. Should they be going off alone?” Keith asked. “We don't really know anything about this planet.”

“We were supposed to split off anyway – Hunk wanted to go see if there was anything edible down here.”

“Yeah, but we haven't searched the area or checked for wildlife or -” Keith hesitated, catching himself before he could list off a dozen other potential threats, each less likely than the one before it.

“She's got Shiro with her,” Lance said, like that meant they _weren't_ going to get ambushed by a passing Galra patrol at any second. “If we're splitting up, I'm gonna grab Hunk and check out the woods. Maybe there's something edible in there.” Lance smirked. “Or hot aliens.”

“'Uninhabited' means no hot aliens,” Keith said.

Lance rolled his eyes, but he mostly seemed amused, not mad. “Yeah, yeah, and 'Keith' means wet blanket, I get it.” Lance shaded his eyes with one hand and scanned the water's edge. “Still, I wouldn't say no to not having to eat goo for a few days. Almost as good as a hot alien, am I right?”

“I'm sure you're right,” Keith said flatly. “We should probably wait for Shiro to get back before we go exploring.”

“Why?” Lance asked. “So he can tell us to watch our backs and stay on the comms? I know we're not the great Keith Kogane, but I think we can figure out that much ourselves, thanks.”

Great, at some point Keith had gone back to being Lance's favorite arch enemy. “I never said you couldn't, just that we shouldn't split up without letting the others know.”

“They didn't seem too worried about taking off without saying anything. But hey, if it makes you feel better, you stay here and watch the lions. When Shiro gets back, you can tell him where we went.”

“I don't think-”

Lance cut him off. “Wait a minute, where's Hunk?” He strode up the grass until he was standing next to Keith. He swung his head back and forth, scanning the edge of the lake, then turned to peer in the direction Shiro and Pidge had gone. “Did you see him leave?”

“This is _exactly_ why I didn't want us to split up,” Keith said. He unclenched his fists and forced himself to take a deep breath. “Okay, I'm going to get Shiro, you-”

“No, got him. _Hunk!_ ” Lance hollered loud enough to make Keith start. “What are you doing?”

Keith saw movement at the edge of the forest, in the opposite direction to where Shiro and Pidge had gone. Hunk popped out from behind one of the massive trees, waving at them. He had something clenched in each hand. He yelled something, but the wind caught it.

“Man, I swear,” Lance said. “Just wander off into the woods all alone, never mind telling your team where you are or waiting for someone to watch your back. I swear, we can't let him go anywhere on his own.”

Keith resisted the urge to glare at the back of Lance's head. “Yeah. Some people.”

“I'd better keep an eye on him,” Lance said. He broke into a jog before Keith could react. “You stay here and guard the lions!” he called over his shoulder.

“Lance!” Keith almost ran after him, but just as he started to move he felt something... spark. Like electricity in the air. His first thought was that Lance had been right about rain coming, and he actually glanced up for a moment, looking for lightning.

Then he heard it, a low-grade humming, a buzz he could only barely hear, almost more of a vibration that made the hair on the back of his neck stand on end.

Blue roared.

****

Hunk had no idea what just happened.

He hadn't intended to get so far away from the others, but Keith had been doing his vigilant sentry thing, and Pidge was working with her scanners and Lance looked like he was enjoying watching the water. And the whole reason Hunk had wanted to come down there to begin with was that Coran said the Kes and Alteans had similar nutritional needs, and Alteans and humans had – largely – similar nutritional needs, so there were good odds that something down on the surface might be edible.

The food goo is... nice. Certainly Hunk can see how it's more efficient than having to restock supplies and store perishables. But it lacked soul. And taste. And... everything else besides basic nutritional content.

So he'd wandered off a little further than he'd intended to, examining the plants that grew along the edge of the water, then the vines that dangled down from the tree branches, and finally the trees themselves. He hadn't realized how far he'd gotten from the rest of the team until he heard Lance call him, voice thin on the wind, coming from too far away.

Keith and Lance were staring at him from back by the lions – which were a lot further behind him than he'd thought they were. Lance hollered something Hunk couldn't hear over the wind. “I'll be right there,” he yelled. He had a thick orange tuber that he was pretty sure was edible and waved it to show them what he was doing. He eyed the small pile of plants he'd accumulated and tried to figure out how he was going to carry it all back in one trip.

And then everything had gone weird. He'd heard Lance and Keith yelling to each other – or _at_ each other, with those two honestly, it was better odds they were fighting – but then everything had gone kind of blurry.

Except not everything. Just the air along the edge of the treeline, where the forest ended and the thick grass of the lakeside began. Everything else was still solid and clear.

His skin felt weird. Like the last time Pidge had tried to reprogram one of the personal replicators back at the Castle and she'd accidentally shocked herself. Hunk had been sitting right beside her and he'd felt the sizzle of electricity, tasted the ozone.

This was a thousand times stronger.

And then the whole ground shook, like something had just dropped out of the sky.

Blue roared.

Hunk dropped what he was carrying and left it all. He could get more or come back – for Blue to sound like that something had to be wrong. They were under attack, or worse-

_Lance._

Hunk could see his friend just a few feet away as he came out of the woods. Lance was frozen in midstep, eyes clenched shut, mouth open. “Lance? _Lance!_ ” He barreled across the few feet between them – and smacked face-first into something solid and invisible.

He staggered back and almost fell, barely catching himself against a tree. “What the -”

A forcefield of some kind. Invisible, for sure, but solid enough. That would have been what he felt a minute ago – the power required to create something like this would have been easy to feel from just a few feet away. And Lance-

He was caught inside it.

“Lance,” Hunk said. He saw Keith on the other side running full out toward them, only to slam to a stop about five feet away. He didn't stumble like Hunk had, but he did slam his fist into the shield. He was yelling something, but Hunk couldn't hear him.

It would have to wait. Lance was – he couldn't be breathing in there, could he? And now that Hunk was watching, he could see Lance shaking – trembling? Or was he trying to break out and that was all the movement he could manage. “Lance, buddy, can you hear me?” There was only a few inches between them, but he couldn't see any sign that Lance heard him.

He pressed his palms over the shield and ran them over the length of it, trying to find... something. Anything. There was nothing to find though – it was flat and featureless – if Hunk couldn't feel the pressure of it against his palms he wouldn't have even been able to say it was there at all.

Lance shuddered, and Hunk couldn't swallow past the surge of panic in his throat. His friend was going to suffocate in front of him.

Then he paused and looked closer.

Lance was shaking minutely inside the barrier – but his right hand, raised slightly in front of him, moved. Just his fingers, and just the tips but...

Hunk slid his hand over and brushed his fingers over Lance's.

And then yelped, jerking back and clutching his hand to his chest. The forcefield had packed a hell of a shock, only... Only he hadn't touched the field at all, only Lance's hand.

“Oh no,” Hunk said. He didn't let himself think about what he was about to do or how much it was going to hurt, just lunged forward and grabbed at Lance's hand. He felt the shock of energy as soon as he touched Lance's skin, but he grit his teeth and carefully tugged at Lance's fingers.

Lance's hand moved, but slowly. Hunk had to breathe past the repeated jolts of energy shooting down his arm and forced himself to ignore it.

He could see Keith over Lance's shoulder, both hands pressed against the forcefield and staring at them with wide eyes.

He tried to get his hand around Lance's wrist so he could have a better angle and he felt the barrier warp at the place where it touched Lance's skin. He bit his lip and pressed in, the barrier giving way beneath his fingers. It felt like slipping his fingers directly into a light socket and holy god this was going to hurt.

He got his fingers around Lance's arm, braced his feet, and pulled with everything he had.

_Please. Please please pleasepleaseplease._

He staggered back a step, then two, then Lance was out and they tumbled backwards onto the ground.

Hunk lay there for a long moment, staring up at the trees and trying to make his breathing even out. No more shocks, but the absence hurt almost as bad. His entire arm felt numb and tingling at the same time, and his hand was trembling against his leg.

“Lance,” he said. His friend was sprawled over his legs, and Hunk reached down with his other hand to touch the top of Lance's head. “You awake, man? Lance?”

Lance's head moved, just a little, but otherwise he was still. Hunk carefully lifted Lance by the shoulders and eased him to the ground as he shifted up to his knees. “On no, oh man, what do I-” He turned to look over his shoulder but there was no one there to turn to beside Keith, still on the other side of the barrier. Keith was yelling something, but no sound made its way through the shield and Hunk swallowed, hard.

No sound through the barrier – and no sound through the comms. He tried anyway, switching to the team channel. “Keith? Anyone, can you hear me?”

There was a weird kind of silence that he almost never heard over the comms – the team channel was always full of sound – people breathing or laughing or talking or screaming. But the channel was dead silent now, no one on it but him.

He leaned in to check on Lance again, one hand flat against his chest to make sure he was breathing. He was, deep and steady but his heart was pounding beneath Hunk's hand. Was that normal? What the hell happened to someone who'd been shocked anyway? “Someone, please answer me, because I have no idea what to do here.”

“Hello?”

“Oh, thank god, I-” Hunk paused and slowly raised his eyes to meet Keith's again. The Red Paladin was watching them and gesturing intently, trying to get Hunk to understand something, but the only thing Hunk could focus on at the moment was the fact that the voice hadn't come over the comms.

And it wasn't one of his teammates.

“Is someone there?” Hunk glanced around quickly, scanning the edge of the forest warily. He touched the bayard on his hip but didn't draw it.

On the other side of the barrier, Keith looked like he was going to have an aneurysm.

“Hello?” the voice called again. It sounded like it was coming from nearby, just inside the boundary of the forest. Hunk glanced at Lance again, then pointed firmly from him to Keith.

Keith threw both his hands in the air and yelled something.

“I'll be right back,” Hunk said, though he wasn't really sure who he was supposed to be talking to. “Just... don't go anywhere.” He held his bayard tightly in his right hand and slowly took a few steps deeper into the forest.

It got dark further under the canopy. Not like night, but a deep shadow that made him want to look over his shoulder. He clenched his fingers around his bayard and wished fervently that Keith had been on _this_ side of the barrier.

“Hello?” he called again. “Who's there?” He licked his lips. “Can you help? My friend is hurt – can you get the barrier down?”

“There is death beyond the barrier.” The voice was closer now. “The enemy comes. We must defend ourselves.”

“The enemy?” Hunk spun slowly on his heel, eyes scanning the space between the trees. “Do you mean us? The Lions? We're not your enemy. We're Voltron? You may have heard of us? Defenders of the universe? Or, we're working on it, anyway. We're not here to hurt you.”

Something flickered in the corner of his vision and he spun around, bringing his bayard up. He stopped himself before the weapon could form, but didn't lower it. There was nothing there, but the hair on the back of his neck was prickling. “Can you put the barrier down so I can get help?”

“There is no help.” The voice was right behind him now, and for the first time Hunk noticed there was a strange grating sound to it. Like the throat making the sounds wasn't made for human words. “No help. No help.”

Hunk spun, arm drawn back and ready to strike, only to find himself staring at a bird.

It was brightly colored, with aquamarine feathers that darkened to a bright pink on the wings. Is was perched on a branch at eye level just a few feet away and tipped its head sideways at him. “No help. The enemy is coming.”

“ _Quiznak_ ,” Hunk said feelingly.

The bird hopped backwards a few inches on the branch and ruffled its feathers. “Quiznak,” it said, in a voice that was nothing like the one it had used a moment ago. “Quiznak. My friend is hurt. Quiznak.”

Hunk lowered his arm slowly. “I don't suppose you're hiding a healing pod around here somewhere? Or the off button for that thing, huh?”

The bird opened its beak and made a sound like Galra laser blasters. Hunk jumped half a foot in the air and flailed slightly as he checked over his shoulder to make sure no one had snuck on them. “Asshole bird!”

“Asshole,” the bird cackled. “This is a mandatory planetary evacuation. My friend is hurt.”

Hunk pressed a hand against his chest and bent over for a second, dragging in a few deep breaths before he straightened up. “Okay,” he said. “This is fine. We're trapped on the wrong side of an alien forcefield with a wounded teammate and a parrot who enjoys psychological torture. This planet sucks.”

“ _Hunk!_ ”

****

Pidge crashed into the forcefield and staggered backwards a couple of steps as she tried to catch her balance. “Oh, that's just great. Sorry, Shiro, I did _not_ see that coming. We must have tripped some kind of sensor-”

Shiro wasn't looking at her, staring back toward the lions, his expression grim.

“What is it?” Pidge craned her neck trying to see what had caught his attention.

He said something, or at least Pidge was pretty sure he did – she could see his mouth moving. “I can't hear you,” she said, shaking her head and pointing to her ear with her free hand. “The forcefield must block sound as well.” She flipped her comm channel open. “Can you hear me now? Shiro? Keith?”

No one responded. Shiro gave her a pained look and looked over his shoulder again.

He didn't want to leave her hear, trapped, but whatever was going on over there had to be bad enough to get his attention. “Go,” she said, pointing toward the Lions. “Go, whatever it is, I'll be fine.”

He hesitated just a moment, and that was when she heard Hunk yell for Lance.

The sounds was muted through the trees, and obviously came from a little way off, but it was clearly Hunk and he sounded scared.

If she could hear him, then he was probably on this side of the barrier.

“I gotta-” She jabbed a finger into the woods toward the direction of Hunk's voice. Shiro shook his head sharply, but she didn't want to see what he'd do.

The woods only got thicker the further into them she moved. She was still close enough to the edge to see the clearing and lake through the space between the trees, but after a minute even that was gone, and she found herself in shadow, surrounded by ancient towering trees, sinking ankle-deep in thick green moss as she ran.

“Hunk?” She called. “Lance? Keith? Guys, are you out here?”

She paused for a moment, braced with one foot on a fallen log, and held her breath as she listened for a response. Nothing but silence, not even the wind in the trees.

“Guys!” She glanced down at the scanner she still held in her hand as if it could tell her where her teammates were, and she almost choked.

The energy readings were still there, the one to the south still faint, but steady. But the closer one, the one that had appeared shortly before the forcefield activated, had increased massively. Data scrolled down the side of the screen and Pidge chewed on her bottom lip as she flipped through the readings.

 _Not_ good.

Something chittered.

Pidge froze and slowly lowered the scanner. Sitting on the fallen log, just a few feet away from her, was a little fox-like creature.

It wasn't any bigger than a house cat, but the pointed, tufted ears made her think of the foxes that had lived in the woods behind her family's house back on Earth. The animal here was a pale tan, and it's ears and the tuft of its tail were a bright, vivid pink. It chittered at her and stood, tail swishing gently behind it.

“Um. Hi, fella.” Pidge waved for a second, then immediately felt like an idiot. The furry woodland creatures probably did not know how to wave. “I hope you're friendly because I really don't want to find out if the healing tubes work on rabies.”

The fox made a snuffling sound, almost like a sneeze.

“No offense,” Pidge said. She glanced down at the readout on her scanner again and grimaced. “Sorry, little guy, I gotta go find my friends pronto.” She pushed off the log and jumped back down to the thick mossy forest floor. The fox yipped and jumped down beside her, then ran ahead a few dozen feet before stopped and looking over its shoulder at her.

“Go on. I'm not gonna chase you,” Pidge said. She scanned the woods ahead of her, looking for a flash of yellow, blue or red, but all she saw was more trees.

The fox yipped again and ran back toward her. It jumped around in front of her for a second, like it was trying to get her attention, then ran back to where it was and stared at her, tail wagging.

“Are you trying to show me something?” Pidge felt a little silly saying it, but the little puffballs on the trash nebula had been more intelligent than she'd assumed at first. And it was an alien world, maybe intelligent foxes were a _thing_ here.

She hesitated. “Hunk! Guys, where are you?” She listened to her shout fade into the forest, but there was no response, no sign that anyone had heard her.

“All right.” She pointed a stern finger at the fox. “No nonsense. I need to find my friends. Can you help with that?”

It swished its tail and skipped a few feet further away. A couple more foxes were peeking around tree trunks, shining black eyes watching her curiously.

“If you're luring me somewhere to eat me, I'm gonna taze you,” she said.

The fox made a rude sound and scampered off ahead. Pidge cast one quick glance back toward where she'd left Shiro, then ran after it.

Within a couple of minute it had brought her back the the edge of the forest, the trees thinning slightly, and the sun breaking through the gaps between the trees. The light had a distinctly reddish cast to it, and Pidge had the sudden unwelcome realization that she was about to be trapped in this forest at night.

The fox yipped sharply and broke through the trees ahead, heading straight for the person lying in the grass.

“Lance!” Pidge darted across the little bit of grass between them and came up short at Lance's side. He was out cold, sprawled in the grass, but when she grabbed his hand his skin was warm and she could tell he was still breathing. He groaned a little as she jostled him and made a face like he didn't want to wake up.

She could see Keith and Shiro on the other side of the forcefield. Shiro looked like he was talking on the comms, hopefully working with Allura to get them out of there. Keith waved at her and yelled something she couldn't make out.

Lance dragged in a deep breath and opened his eyes with a pained grunt. “Pidge, you gotta stop using your bayard on me.”

“Wasn't me this time.” She offered him a hand, which he took after a long moment of consideration. He was heavier than he looked but she dragged him to a sitting position. “Where's Hunk? I heard him a few minutes ago, he was definitely on this side of the forcefield.”

“I-” Lance glanced around, seeming to realize the barrier was there for the first time. “What the hell happened? Where did this thing come from?”

“I think we tripped some kind of ancient alarm or something.” She waved her scanner at him. “We need to get it turned off though, we've got a problem.”

“We've always got a problem,” Lance said, so matter-of-fact about it they might have been discussing the weather. “Have you seen our lives lately? Nothing but crises.”

Pidge can't help but grin at him. “Sorry, is the intergalactic war inconveniencing you?”

“Yes,” Lance said, with great feeling.

Blaster fire sounded from not far away, the too-familiar sound of Galra weapons. Pidge grabbed her bayard while Lance staggered to his feet and practically lunged toward the tree line, his bayard flaring with blue light as he summoned his weapon. “Hunk!”

There was a crashing sound from inside the trees, then Hunk burst out of the woods. He practically beamed at them. “Lance! You're okay! Oh man, thank goodness I was seriously gonna freak out if you didn't wake up soon. Pidge! Where did you come from?”

She jerked her thumb over her shoulder. “Shiro and I got separated while I was looking around. We heard blaster fire.”

Hunk made a face. “It's fine. It's just this asshole bird.”

Pidge and Lance exchanged a look. “Okay. Was the bird armed, or-?”

“That would have been less annoying,” Hunk said. “Do we have a plan for getting out of here? Because it's getting dark, there are definitely animals in here, and also Lance kind of got a little electrocuted when that forcefield landed on him so we should probably get him to a healing tube.”

“That explains a lot,” Lance said with a grimace. “I definitely feel like a forcefield fell on me.”

“It's blocking our comms,” Pidge said. “I tried to communicate with Shiro but he didn't hear me.”

“Same,” Hunk said. “I just tried the team channel though. Maybe the Castle?”

Pidge tried flipping to a different channel. “Allura? Coran?” She waited a beat, then tried again. “Green Paladin to the Castle of Lions, this is a distress call, please respond.” She shrugged and killed the channel again. “Nothing. Just dead air. It doesn't sound like there's anyone on the other end at all.”

“Man I do _not_ want to spend the night out here,” Lance said. “Camping was never really my thing.”

He looked a little ashen, now that Pidge was looking for it. She gave Hunk a quick glance behind Lance's back as she tried to remember the symptoms of electric shock. “Well, we have a bigger problem than that.”

“I was really hoping you'd forget about the bigger problem,” Lance said.

“Sorry,” Pidge said, “but I'm really invested in not dying.”

“Oh, great, it's a life-and-death problem.” Lance rolled his head a little. “I hate those.”

Pidge held out the scanner for Hunk to see. “When we landed, there was only one power signature. Then the second one popped up. Look at the energy signature.”

Hunk's brow furrowed. “Oh man, this is not stable. Look at the spikes.”

“It happened once the forcefield went up. Whatever power source is running this thing-” she pointed at the shield and all three of them followed her finger to stare at nothing. “It's going to go. And soon.”

Lance scrubbed his hand over his face. “Okay, so that should take out the forcefield. Problem solved, right?”

“It'll definitely take out the forcefield,” Pidge said. “Also about three-quarters of the continent.”

Lance narrowed his eyes at her. “This continent? The one we're currently standing on?”

She nodded.

He sighed. “Yeah, that's a problem. What do we do?”

“Shut it down.” She shrugged. “I can't tell you more until I get to it, but if we can figure out how to turn the forcefield down, that should stop the power surges and hopefully eliminate the entire problem.”

“How far away is it?”

She double checked the scanner, even though she already knew. “Not far. Four or five miles, maybe.”

They all three stared into the dark forest. The sun was slowly setting behind them, and the leaves were lit with a deep red light. It didn't make things look any less imposing.

“Great,” Lance said.

“What are the odds Allura and Coran are gonna figure this out and just-” Hunk made an exploding gesture with his hands. “From orbit.”

“Not great,” Pidge said. “I don't know if Coran ran any additional scans after we came down here – if he did, he didn't say anything to me. If Shiro and Keith are able to communicate with them, they'll probably do it now, but then we have the problem of the energy source almost definitely being under the forcefield with us.”

“Doesn't make any sense to leave the power source for your defenses outside your defenses,” Lance said. “It's under the shield.”

“So even if they can see it, they probably can't get to it. Coran said the Kes's defenses made Altea's look weak, remember? What are the odds the Castle has anything that can get through that thing?”

“Okay,” Hunk said. “Great. So all we have to do is hike four or five miles, in the dark, through difficult terrain, with unknown wildlife while one of us is injured to find an unknown power source none of us knows how to turn off all while hoping it doesn't explode in a holocaust that destroys half the planet and all of us with it.”

Lance sighed. “Sounds like Tuesday. Pidge, gimme your thing.” He plucked the tablet out of her hand and strode toward the forcefield, where Shiro and Keith were still waiting. He flicked his fingers over the touchscreen, then scribbled something with his forefinger. He held the tablet up and pointed at it. Pidge caught a glimpse of it: _forcefield's gonna blow_ scrawled on the tablet screen in Lance's sloppier-than-usual handwriting, the letters big enough for their teammates to make out from several feet away. Lance wiped the screen, then wrote again and held it up. _We'll turn it off._

Keith shook his head, but Shiro just looked resigned. He jabbed a finger at them and mouthed two words that Pidge had no trouble making out.

_Be safe._

Lance gave their leader a grin and an easy salute. “All right, brainiac.” He handed her the tablet again. “You're the one with a plan. Lead the way.”

Hunk crossed his arms over his chest and glared at the woods. “Is this a good time to mention I failed survival training at the Garrison? Like. Three times.”

****

Keith knocked one closed fist against the barrier as he watched most of his team walk away. “I don't like this.”

Shiro ran a hand through his hair. “I'd feel a lot better about it if one of us was with them.”

“Damnit!” Keith spun on his heel and stalked a few paces from the barrier. “I knew we shouldn't have split up. I should have kept an eye on Hunk. I shouldn't have let Lance run off like that.”

“No one anticipated this happening.” Shiro sighed as the paladins disappeared into the trees. “We'll just have to trust them to handle this.”

Keith gave his friend a sideways glance.

“We're going to keep looking for another solution, of course,” Shiro said. “And Allura and Coran. But for now, until we get that shield down, I'm out of ideas.”

“We're all gonna die,” Keith said.

“Look, if that energy signature gets any more destabilized, I want you to take Red and get out of here.”

Honestly, Keith had wondered how long it would take Shiro to get around to that. “While you do what exactly?”

Shiro doesn't rise to the bait. “The Lions are incredibly powerful weapons. We need to ensure they survive, even if the rest of us don't. Take Red, get the others to follow. With any luck none of this will be necessary, but I'd rather have a plan.”

“It's a bad plan,” Keith said, carefully swallowing other, angrier things he wanted to say. “I can barely get Black to listen to me on a good day. Yellow and Green have never even acknowledged my existence, and if Blue likes me as much as her paladin does, she'll probably decide to stay on the exploding planet rather than listen to me.”

Shiro ignored him. “There's no reason for all of us to die if something goes wrong.”

“Right,” Keith said. “So you'll save yourself, too, if it comes down to it.”

Shiro didn't meet his eyes, staring darkly toward the treeline where they others had gone.

“You wouldn’t leave them here alone,” Keith said. He stared at the trees and tried to imagine packing up and walking away, knowing the rest of his team wouldn't have the option of doing the same. He couldn't see it. “So do me the courtesy of letting me make my own choice.”

Shiro shrugged. “I've learned not to argue with you when you get that look on your face.”

“Smart man.” Keith crossed his arms over his chest and blew his hair out of his face. “Seriously, though, we're all gonna die.”

Shiro cracked a grin. “Don't go giving the universe ideas.”

Keith tipped his head back. “Do those look like storm clouds to you?”

****

“I think it's getting darker. Do you guys think it's getting darker? Because it definitely seems like it's getting darker.”

Pidge planted both palms on a downed tree and vaulted over it. “It's nightfall, Hunk. If the readings I took back on the Castle are correct, it'll be night for about ten hours.”

Lance stared at the tree as if it had personally offended him before hauling himself over it with a great deal less energy than Pidge had. He looked even paler than he had before and Pidge was pretty sure whatever shock he'd gotten from the forcefield had left him with a nasty headache. He was keeping pace so far, but he didn't look like he was enjoying himself. “Also, I'm pretty sure we're due for rain. There were some dark clouds on the horizon before all this started.” He grinned, a flash of bright white in the encroaching gloom. “Teach me to be careful what I wish for.”

Pidge pushed her hair out of her face. “On the bright side, the rain probably can't get through the forcefield either, so at least we won't get wet?”

“Are we _there_ yet?” Hunk asked.

“I'm gonna break both your knees if you ask me that again,” Pidge said as her left foot went straight through the rotted out center of the next fallen tree.

The damn bird fluttered down from the canopy and perched just over her head. “Are we there yet? Are we there yet? All right braniac, lead the way.”

Pidge took the hand Lance offered her and let him haul her out of the log. “Hunk, I've never hurt an animal before in my life but I'm gonna shoot your bird.”

“You don't have a gun,” Hunk said.

“I'm gonna get Lance to shoot your bird.”

“Lance's sharpshooting services do not come cheap.” Lance waited till she was on her feet again before he let go. “And I don't think I do assassinations.”

“It's a parrot,” Hunk said. “And it's not _mine_ , I just had the misfortune to find it first.”

“I think it's a songbird actually? Or closer to one anyway. See its beak and the shape of its head? More like a mockingbird or something like that than a parrot, I think. Maybe a corvid, but I don't think so? It's all kind of moot anyway since this isn't Earth, none of the comparisons are really going to work but-” She looked up to find both of them watching her nearly identical looks. “What?”

“Uh-huh,” Lance said. “Anyway, considering this is the only inhabitant of this planet we've spoken to so far, that kind of makes it the ambassador, right? So totally an assassination.”

“I think you're reaching. Or delirious,” Pidge said.

“Possibly both,” Lance admitted with a tired half-grin. “I don't want my knees broken, but seriously, how much further?”

“Further than you want to hear about,” Pidge said.

“Yeah,” Hunk said. “I definitely think it's starting to rain. Thanks a lot, Lance.”

“As long as it's not acid or lava, I don't care,” Lance said. He closed his eyes for a second and took a long, slow breath, one hand pressed to his chest.

Pidge hesitated for a minute, waiting for him to move again before keeping pace at his side, letting Hunk clear a trail in front. She didn't ask if he was alright. It didn't really matter because there was nothing they could do about it yet.

A low, rolling rumble started up, a nearly sub-audible growl that Pidge felt more than heard. The leaves on the trees rustled slightly, and she felt the vibration from her knees to her toes.

Hunk had paused a few steps ahead, one hand braced against a tree. “Was that thunder? Please tell me that was thunder.”

“You're from Hawaii,” Lance said. “How do you not recognize an earthquake?”

“I do recognize an earthquake,” Hunk retorted. “That's why I want someone to tell me it was thunder. An earthquake is the last thing we need.”

“Bad news,” Pidge said. She dug her tablet out and pulled up the scanner readings again. “The energy source is getting worse. It may be trying to vent some of the energy to stabilize itself and that's causing the tremors. I think we can expect to see more.”

“Oh that's just great,” Hunk said. “This planet just keeps getting better.” He glared up at the trees for a second. “All we need is for the Galra to show up to make this perfect.”

“Why you gotta tempt things like that?” Lance asked. He kept moving, clasping Hunk on the shoulder as he passed him. “Come on. Keep moving. If we get blown up Keith will never let me live it down.”

“If we get blown up, Keith will probably blown up too,” Hunk said.

“At least I'll have that to comfort me in my final moments.”

“That's messed up, man. Also you look like you're gonna puke.”

“Don't say puke to someone who looks like they're gonna puke!”

“Sorry, sorry!”

“Just over a mile left,” Pidge said. She darted ahead, the scanner held out in front of her – more to light the way than because she really wanted to watch every fluctuation and spike in the readings. “We can do this.”

Hunk met her eyes briefly and his expression looked tense in the blue light of her screen. “Sure we can. We're basically experts at making shit up in disasters.”

“Gonna puke!” The bird screamed from somewhere above their heads. “Puke and die!”

Lance laughed so hard Hunk had to basically carry him for a few steps. “That bird knows what's up.”

“Quiet,” the bird said. “Quiet.”

“You be quiet, you miserable waste of feathers,” Hunk said. “Or I'll let Lance assassinate you.”

“No assassinations,” Lance said. “I feel like that's a line Shiro wouldn't be happy about us crossing.”

“Total silence is essential,” the bird said in a hushed voice. It sounded different again – the voice it was mimicking wasn't one of theirs. It sounded older, kind of gravelly, maybe a woman, for all you could make that kind of judgment with non-humans. “The guardians hunt by sound. Puke, puke, puke.”

All three of them paused briefly to glance up in the direction the bird's voice had come from.

“Well,” Lance said after a long moment, squaring his shoulders and starting forward again. “That wasn't ominous at _all._ ”

****

It was starting to rain for real by the time Pidge came back from her scouting mission.

Lance could hear it. Or he was pretty sure he could. Pidge had been right – Pidge was usually right as long as the subject involved science in some way – and none of the rain was actually making it to them, but he thought if he listened, he could hear the sound of it hitting the forceshield.

It sounded like it was raining hard. He hoped Shiro and Keith were somewhere dry. He hoped they'd taken the Lions and gone back to the Castle until this was over. _Someone_ needed to be safe, and it sure wasn't the three of them.

It sure wasn't him.

His heart skipped a beat again, so heavily it almost hurt, and he breathed in slowly, closing his eyes as he counted slowly until it evened out.

It was getting worse, happening more often and for longer periods of time. Sometime it would race, sometimes it seemed to skip. A couple of times now it had pounded so hard he felt like he was actually shaking. He wasn't sure how getting caught in the forcefield and knocked out had messed up his heart, but it was either that or there was something on the planet making this happen. What didn't really matter though. He needed to hold it together long enough to make sure they shut the power source down or nothing else would ever matter again.

One of Hunk's hands cupped the back of his head, fingers carefully kneading at the base of his skull. “Headache getting worse?”

Lance nodded slowly. “Yeah. Little. I can manage though.”

Hunk grinned at him. Lance couldn't see him very clearly in the darkness, but he could hear it in his voice. “I know you can.” He shifted a little. “I think Pidge is back.”

Pidge was small and light, and she'd had a lot of practice being stealthy while she was sneaking around at the Garrison. She barely made a sound as she picked her way back down the hill toward them.

The power source was dead ahead of them now, probably under or inside the hill, if Hunk's guess was right. Pidge had left them behind to go scout ahead and check for any more surprises - “Alone,” she'd said. “Hunk's as steathly as a ten-car pile-up and Lance, you look like you're going to throw up. Don't throw up on me.” She'd disappeared into the woods for the last twenty minutes, and the only connection they'd had was the sound of her breathing through the open comm channel on the helmet Lance held in his lap.

“Good news and bad news,” Pidge said in a low voice. “The Ambassador was right. We need to be very quiet from now on. Helmets on, comms only. No lights. Follow me.”

Lance pushed himself up to his feet using Hunk's shoulder like a crutch and started after her. The hill was harder to climb than it should have been, even with the additional need to be silent, and the low rumbling tremors that were coming every few minutes now. He felt a little light headed by the time they reached the top. Pidge wrapped her hands around his wrist slow enough not to startle him, and tugged him down behind an old stump. Hunk crouched down on his other side and they all three slowly peered over the edge.

For a long, tense minute, Lance had no idea what they were doing.

Then part of the forest floor moved.

“Holy quiznak,” Hunk said. “What on Earth is that?”

“It's a spider,” Pidge said.

“That's a fucking minivan,” Lance said.

“It's a big spider,” Pidge said. “I tried to count, but I lost track.”

Lance stared at her. “There's more than one?”

“There's a couple dozen, I think. But they aren't all that big. There's maybe four or five that size and the rest are more like... Large dogs. Maybe the occasional horse.”

“I quit,” Hunk said. “I am handing in my resignation effective immediately. When does the next wormhole to Earth open?”

“I can't be sure,” Pidge said, “but I'm pretty sure they're skittering around directly on top of where we want to go.” She grabbed Lance's helmet and turned his head to look where she wanted him to. “You've got night vision on, right? Do you see it?”

“Yeah.” Behind a couple dozen pulsing heat signatures, Lance saw exactly what Pidge had. “That looks like a bulkhead, or a vault door or something.”

“That's going to be our way in.”

“And all we have to do is fight our way through a monster the size of a house,” Hunk said. “That's. Awesome.”

“Man, I wish Shiro was here,” Pidge said.

“Yeah, he could just turn on the old Galra arm and karate chop his way through that mess.”

“He... could,” Lance said slowly. “But he wouldn't.”

There was a pause while they both looked at him and Lance focused on breathing steadily. “What are you thinking?” Pidge asked finally.

“A plan.” Lance leaned a little further out, scanning as much of the base of the hill as he could. “Shiro wouldn't go busting in there if he could avoid it. He'd have a plan.” Possibly a better one than what Lance had come up with, but beggars couldn't be choosers. “You two get ready to make a run for it. As soon as the base of the hill is clear, you book it. I don't know how long I'll be able to distract them.”

“What are you going to do?” Pidge asked.

Hunk settled for something a little blunter. “No. Absolutely not. I forbid it.”

“Gimme a better plan, then,” Lance said. He gripped his bayard tightly for a long moment. “Yeah, that's what I thought. Give me a minute to get clear, then get ready to move.”

“You have the worst plans,” Hunk said.

Lance laughed and hooked an arm around Hunk's neck, tugging him close for a second. “Yeah, probably. But hey, it could be worse.” He came up in a crouch and grinned. “You could have been stuck out here with Keith. Then you really would be fighting your way through that horde.” He didn't wait for a response before he moved, pushing through the trees a little faster than they had been before, still quiet but not silent.

At the base of the hill, something chittered.

He held his breath for a minute, listening to make sure nothing was heading up the side of the hill toward his teammates, then he took a long, deep breath.

And waved his bayard over his head, blue sparks firing off like fireworks. “Hey, Shelob! Come and get me!”

He didn't wait to see them coming after him, just spun on his heel and ran. “Go!” he yelled. “Tell me when you're clear and I'll double back after I lose the-”

Ahead of him, the entire forest floor seemed to heave and rise up as a spider ten times bigger than the others rose up from where it had been resting.

“Oh, Quiznak,” Lance said. He raised his bayard, ready to fire and hopefully discourage it from picking a fight, or at least make it pause long enough for him to get away.

A thick almost gelatinous wad smacked against his hand, the force of it almost making him spin around. It seeped over the weapons and down his wrist, until most of his weapon and nearly all of his hand was coated in it.

Lance cut hard to the left, dodging through the trees as fast as he could while still looking where he was putting his feet. Whatever it was – spider silk, maybe, but this wasn't Earth and who knew what spiders on Kes-whatever did to trap their prey – it was starting to harden, leaving him basically unarmed.

Heh. Literally.

“Lance,” Pidge's voice was a soft hush over the comms. “We're inside. Turn back now, we'll hold the door until you get back.”

He could hear feet behind him, but didn't risk looking back to see how many, exactly, were on his tail. “Change of plans,” he said. His heart was starting to pound in his chest, harder than it should have been after just a couple of minutes. “Get inside. Fix it. I'll be fine.”

“Lance-”

His legs were feeling like rubber already and the uneven forest floor was making it harder for him to keep up any kind of pace. He could hear them getting closer. “Do it! I've got this-”

Something slammed into the back of his knee and knocked him forward onto his hands and knees. He bit back a shout as he scrambled to his feet, ignoring the increasingly panicked way his teammates were yelling his name over the comms. He just had to stay on his feet. If he could out-run them, he'd be fine. It wouldn't take them long to shut down the power source, and then he'd have backup.

He just had to stay on his feet.

“Go, go, go,” he chanted under his breath.

And then the gunk that had hit him in the back of the knee started to harden.

He went down hard when his knee refused to bend anymore and barely caught himself with his one free hand. Dozens, maybe hundreds of feet were skittering toward him along the forest floor, and not too far behind them, a half dozen hulking shadows were carefully picking their way through the trees.

He cast one desperate look at his bayard, but it was hopeless.

“Guys,” he said, watching as the closest spider darted in toward him, almost warily. “Guys, you can do this. You're the two smartest people I know. This is going to be a cakewalk, got it? Save the day, save the planet, save Shiro and Keith. You got this.”

“Lance,” Hunk said. “Whatever you're about to do, please don't-”

“You got this,” Lance said, and cut the comms.

The spider closest to him came even closer, and all Lance could think was that is a lot of teeth.

****

“Shit,” Pidge said. “Shit, mother-quiznaking-”

“We don't have time for this,” Hunk said. His chest felt tight, breathless, but his voice sounded hard and flat to his ears. The comm channel was dead, but he could still hear Lance's voice. You got this. “Come on, we need to find that power source and shut it down.”

“We have to-”

“If we save Lance just to have us all die in the explosion, then we didn't really save him,” Hunk said. “Or anyone else. Pidge, help me look.” His last few words were less a shout than a plaintive wail and he curled one hand into a fist. “We're running out of time.”

As if to underscore his point, the ground shook again, harder than before. The room trembled around them, dust and crumbling stone falling from the ceiling.

It looked like it had once been a bunker – or maybe just some kind of building that the forest had reclaimed and buried, Hunk wasn't sure if the hill had formed around it or if the hill had been hollowed out to fit it, but it didn't really matter. The room was lined with the ruined remnants of technology – rotted and cracked, water-stained, covered in dirt. There was a control board along one wall with small pale flowers growing out of it.

“Okay, we know it's here. We're practically on top of it.” Pidge took a deep, steadying breath. “Okay. It was probably in a containment unit of some sort, something this powerful. They wouldn't have left it lying around for people to trip over or spill things on. Look for a panel or a door or –“ She cut herself off as the ground started to shake again, harder than before.

The room seemed to tilt sideways and Hunk lunged for the wall to steady himself against. There was a roar building up, a heavy, hard vibration that made his head ring and his teeth ache. Instead of fading away as the last few had, this one seemed to be getting worse, the ground shaking so hard he could feel his knees wobbling.

“We're out of time!” Pidge was clinging to a control panel a few feet away, eyes scouring the room. “We need to find the power source now or we're not going to get the chance!”

****

Miles away, Shiro felt the ground start to move again.

He'd lived through dozens of earthquakes, on more than one planet. What they'd felt before had been tremors. This was worse.

“Is this it?” Keith asked. He shook his head, rain droplets flying from his hair. They were both drenched, but it seemed inconsequential compared to everything else. “Can we tell?”

“I think you should both get out of there,” Allura said over the comm. “The upper atmosphere will probably be far enough, but you may want to come into orbit just in case the explosion dislodges part of the planet's crust.”

Shiro tried not to flinch. Lance and Hunk and Pidge were still out there somewhere, probably right on top of what was about to happen, and there was nothing he could do. He couldn't think about it or he'd scream.

“It's not too late,” he told Keith. He watched his friend closely, kept his expression passive. There was no judgment here. He'd never blame Keith for choosing to survive.

He prayed Keith would choose to survive.

Keith met his gaze for a heartbeat that seemed to last an hour. “You're right,” Keith said. “It's not too late. As long as it hasn't blown yet, there's a chance they'll stop it.”

Shiro nodded slowly. “Allura?”

“Yes, Shiro?”

“You should recall the Lions. Just to be safe.”

“Shiro, what are you-”

There was a moment of silence, then Coran's voice came over the channel, steady and calm. “We're recalling all of the lions except Red. She's fast enough to make a run for it at the last second, so we'll let her hold out till the end.”

“Also she won't listen to me when I call her,” Allura said. She sounded brittle, and Shiro knew she wanted to yell at them, order them back to the Castle to fight another day.

There was still time for Keith to change his mind if he wanted to, but Shiro was leaving this planet with his team, or not at all.

He'd left too many people behind already. He wouldn't do it again.

The ground bucked and heaved, startling a yell out of Keith.

In the distance, from behind the barrier, there was a blinding flash of light.

****

 

“Wait a minute.”

Hunk pushed off against the wall and practically flung himself across the room. He grabbed at the console to steady himself, then dropped to his knees. “Here, here – look this is-” There was a seam in the metal, barely visible under a thousand years of dust and dirt, but his fingers found it. “Get this open, this is what we need.”

Pidge slapped a screwdriver into his hand. “Are you sure?”

“If I'm not it won't matter in a minute.” It was a flathead, thank god. He jammed it into the seam and shoved with every bit of strength and panic he had in him.

Hunk was a strong guy. And he was absolutely panicking.

The panel popped open and Hunk slapped a hand over it to keep it from bouncing back. Inside the panel he could see circuits and thin metallic discs and behind that a brightly glowing crystal that pulsed in time with the way the floor shook. “I've got it.”

“Okay,” Pidge said. “We need to disconnect it, but we need to do it right. We want to make sure we completely shut it down – we can't leave any part of the shield up or we risk the energy source completely destabilizing.”

“Okay,” Hunk said. “This is... wait, does this look familiar to you?”

The crystal flared and the ground heaved hard enough to bounce him into the air. He scrambled for the edge of the console to steady himself, but Pidge staggered and fell against it, her head hitting the edge with a sick cracking sound that made Hunk's stomach heave.

“Pidge!” He grabbed for her as she fell, dragged her against his chest and hunched over her as the room continued to shake. Dust was falling from the ceiling like rain, and bits of the ceiling were starting to crumble and shake loose. Hunk could feel them hitting his back and the back of his head like hail. “Oh, man, this looks nasty. Pidge, can you hear me?”

Her eyes were open, but glassy and she wasn't looking at him. There was blood in her hair and starting to drip down the side of her face, trickling toward her eye. He wiped it away with a thumb and carefully laid her down on the ground. “It's fine,” he told her. “Just hang on. We'll be back on the ship in no time and we'll get you and Lance to the healing tubes and everyone is going to be fine.”

He made himself look away, turn back to the panel. The ground was practically bucking beneath him now, and he knew in a visceral, instinctive way that they were going to die very, very soon if he didn't fix this. The bunker would collapse. The planet would explode. The spiders would come back. It didn't really matter which one happened first, they would all end the same way.

“I recognize this,” he said under his breath. “This is – this is really familiar. Like... like a knockoff of something I've seen before, or... or an upgraded version. The Kes were technologically advanced, Coran said so. And they traded with the Alteans so... So the Alteans weren't stupid, they probably utilized Kes techniques in their own tech, right? I mean, that's just common sense so- The Lions.” It struck him like a fist in the chest, and he dragged in a sharp breath as he scanned the tech in front of him. “This is like the Lions. I've seen something almost like this when I worked on fixing Yellow's shields a couple months back.”

It wasn't exactly the same but – but if the principles were the same that might be all they needed.

“Pidge, if I mess this up and we die in a fiery explosion, I am so sorry and also please don't tell Lance in the afterlife. Thank you.”

Then he reached in with both hands, grabbed the pulsing, white-hot crystal, and wrenched it free.

****

The light flared and faded, and so did the shaking.

“What was that?” Keith said. He'd grabbed Shiro's arm at some point, and his fingers were digging into Shiro's wrist through the armor. “Was that- did they-”

“The shield is down!” Allura shouted over the comm. “Shiro, the shield is down, the energy spikes have completely vanished. They did it!”

“Open a channel,” Shiro said. “Guys, can you hear me? Pidge, Lance, Hunk – someone had better answer me now or you are all doing calisthenics at five am for the rest of your lives.”

There was a long moment of radio silence, then Hunk's voice came through loud and clear. “Shiro!”

Keith cheered and Shiro let his head fall back in relief. “Big man, it's good to hear your voice!” Keith said.

Hunk's next words killed most of the relief he felt. “Pidge is hurt, bad – she won't wake up. And I don't know what happened to Lance – he distracted the horde so we could get inside but he's not answering on the comms.”

Keith was already running, Shiro not a second behind him. “We're on the way, just keep talking to us.”

Red crouched down and they hit the ramp running. Keith lunged for the control chair and Red was in the air almost before his hands hit the controls. “Two minutes, Hunk, we're in the air.”

“Just hurry, okay? I'm worried about Lance.” Hunk grunted. “Oh great, the ambassador is back.”

Shiro exchanged a glance with Keith. “The who?”

“You don't want to know. Just hurry up before I kill something, okay?”

****

Hunk slid his arm under Pidge's shoulders as gently as he could, trying not to jostle her head or neck any more than he had to. He knew you weren't supposed to move people with head injuries, but he was a little worried still about the whole place coming down on them.

Shiro's voice was like a balm, soothing nerves that had been stressed for so long Hunk wasn't even consciously aware of them anymore. He kept up a commentary, talking the whole time he and Keith made their way to them. Hunk felt a little bad for not answering, but it was taking most of his concentration to keep Pidge as still as possible and between her bashed up head and his burned up hands, it was not smooth going.

He pushed the door open with one foot, slowly, waiting to see if anything tried to jump at them.

“Ambassador!” The bird squacked

“Son of a – come on!” Hunk glared at it as he set Pidge down on the ground. “You useless- get out of here!”

“You got this,” the bird told him in Lance's voice.

Hunk sat down heavily. “I guess I did, huh, bud?”

He heard Red before he saw the Lion. She broke through the canopy and settled down a few hundred feet away, maneuvering carefully between the massive trees, eyes glowing like a searchlight and lighting up the whole hillside. Hunk found himself holding his breath until he saw Shiro and Keith run down the ramp.

“Okay, we need to get you both back to the Castle right now.” Shiro held one of Hunk's hands and examined the burns with his flashlight. “This looks like it smarts.”

“That's a word for it,” Hunk said. “Fiery agony works too. Lance isn't answering on comms, I already tried. He cut the channel on us before. I think – I think he was in trouble and didn't want us to hear.”

“You said he distracted the horde?” Shiro asked. “Horde of what?”

“Shiro,” Keith said sharply. “Horde of that.”

“The guardians come out at night,” the Ambassador said in a deep voice.

“Holy crap,” Shiro said.

The spiders were back, dozens of the little ones swarming around Red and into the light. They didn't seem overly concerned with the giant robotic lion, or the light for that matter. Red, for her part, didn't so much as twitch.

Further back in the woods, several massive spiders lumbered between the trees. One of them stopped to examine Red, who somehow managed to exude an air of resigned tolerance.

One of the larger spiders was carrying something – a human shaped and sized something, covered entirely in white.

“Lance,” he said, his voice too loud in the tense silence that had settled over the clearing. Several of the smaller ones scrambled backwards a little, as if he'd scared them.

The big one made a sound that could only be described as... cooing? It approached them quickly and lowered the bundle to the ground a few feet away.

Lance flopped over onto his side and glared at them through the cocoon of spider... stuff he was currently wrapped up in. “Not a word from any of you. Especially those of you with mullets.”

****

A few hours in the healing tubes did wonders for Hunk's hands and Lance's system. Pidge's headache took a little longer to fade, but by the time the sun started to come up on the Kes homeworld – or the part of it they'd almost destroyed, anyway – the team was mostly in one piece.

“Most of the technology is hopelessly degraded by time and the elements,” Coran said, eyeing what looked like a small glass circuit board. “But Number Five and I will give it all a good going over, just in case. We can't risk overlooking anything we can use to our advantage.”

The other four paladins were over with the lions, cheerfully teaching an aquamarine and pink parrot how to swear in at least six different languages. Pidge was carefully petting a small pink fox that had it's paws up on her shins. And Lance was side-eyeing the little kitten-sized spider that was slowly sidling closer to him.

 

art by cyyanide-art 

 

A much bigger one was curled up a few meters away, one eye cracked and watching the paladins carefully. It was making them all a little nervous.

“The fact that the Guardians survived is its own miracle of course,” Coran said. “The Kes were very accomplished animal breeders and trainers – the fact that the animals still possess some instinct or memory of their training is phenomenal.”

“Search and rescue giant spiders,” Shiro said. “That's a hell of a concept.”

“It's probably a good thing the Kes weren't interested in warfare,” Allura said. “Imagine one of those trained for combat instead.”

“That'll keep me up tonight, thanks.” Shiro said dryly.

“It's a shame we'll never know what happened here,” Coran said. He watched the paladins for a long minute. “Every time I forget how long it's really been, something like this reminds me. This was once a massive civilization and now it's... Wild. Empty. Abandoned.”

“Maybe not.” Shiro gripped his shoulder. “Hunk told me that the Ambassador – the bird – one of the things it mimicked to them was some kind of announcement about a planetary evacuation. Didn't you tell me that the Kes had amazing terraforming technology? Maybe when the Galra got too close they just... made a new home, somewhere the war couldn't reach them.”

“It's a nice thought,” Coran said.

“Who knows,” Shiro said. “Maybe we'll see the Kes out there one day. Pidge thinks they wouldn't have left the shield technology up and running if they didn't want to keep parts of the planet safe. Maybe the intended to come back one day, when things were better.”

“Well, we'll just have to hurry up and save the universe then, won't we?” Allura said. “For all the planets and people waiting for things to be better.”

 

 


End file.
